Why shouldn’t you be happy at work?

What do people want their close relationships to be? Full of happiness

What are your school years said to be? The happiest times of your life

What do people want their lives to be remembered as? One filled with lots of happiness

Be Happy At Work

Why is it that in most areas of their lives, people want happiness and yet often, happiness in the workplace is not prioritised or even worse, is frowned upon. At Positive Psychology Learning, we believe that organisations who don’t make efforts to increase the happiness of their employees, are missing out on the benefits of a happy workforce. Fortunately the field of positive psychology is carrying out fascinating research into what makes us be happy at work.

Neglecting Organisational Happiness

Having worked in organisations where the wellbeing and happiness of employees isn’t paramount, and in our line of business we have seen even more organisations where the same attitude to employee applies. We’ve seen cases where leaders were ruining morale by taking the mindset that employees should be grateful to have a job, where managers felt that the happiness and wellbeing of their employees deserved scant consideration and where it was solely the responsibility of the employee to motivate themselves and find job satisfaction. This approach may have been acceptable in the past and may have seemed successful, however, there is a growing justification that a psychology approach to the workplace, in particular, ensuring the happiness of employees, is having a fruitful impact for organisations.

Why Embrace Happiness At Work?

We are now finding that organisations and leaders are embracing the fact that happier employees are better for business. This is backed up by research that shows that happier employees are:

More productive

More engaged in their work

Less susceptible to stress and burnout

More committed to the goals of the organisation

The happiness of employees is taking on more importance in the workplace and is having a positive impact on organisations that experience growth and thrive and those that don’t. Introducing a culture where leaders care about employee happiness is driving organisations on to greater success. Taking a positive psychology approach and implementing the science of happiness, is delivering some exciting and profound results in organisations to enable employees to be happy at work.

Increasing Employee Happiness

This may be all well and good, but what can you do to bring about more happiness for your employees? Here are some ways from the field of positive psychology in which you can increase the happiness of your employees:

Encouraging their personal development. When people are able to enhance their skillset, it also boosts their confidence and effectiveness, so start putting development plans in place for employees and committing to them

Foster an environment where employees are able to make choices and decisions on their own. By having autonomy over decisions it leads to greater wellbeing and happiness

Find ways to give employees tasks which they excel at and that they also enjoy. In doing so, employees will be happier in the activities that they are working on. This may seem logical, however, we’ve often found that organisations have a belief that all employees should be good at everything and so assign tasks that may be an employee’s weakness. This can lower productivity, motivation and also happiness

All in all, studies are showing that the happiness of your employees is important, not only for their wellbeing and job satisfaction, but also for the ability for your employees capacity to fulfill their potential and for your organisation to thrive.